Themes/ TOPICS
Workshops are entirely customisable to your needs and topics, as the tools and techniques focus on the same thing – your brain – whatever you are doing. This can range from leadership development to scientific research, from social change to improved business practices or design to stress and anxiety reduction. The catergories below are therefore best thought of as broad “areas”.
CREATIVITY AND INNOVATION
Whether individually or collectively, the fundamental creativity and innovation challenge is to seek the 'New and Different' rather than the 'Old and the Same'. But how does the brain process this? How does it eplore the New and Different?
Discover ways to change your natural focus.
achieving goals
Intentions are good, but actions are like the fossil records we leave behind. Without them, there is no trace of our contribution. But often - individually and/ or collectively - our actions and innate motivations are misaligned.
Discover ways to make achieving goals more natural and enjoyable.
focused productivity
Stressed multi-tasking is (generally) the enemy of creativity and innovation. But the answer in a dynamic and fast-paced environment is not simply more 'relaxation'. Rather, it is to be able to enter an focussed, productive and enjoyable state when needed.
Develop tools and techniques to do this.
Services
Tailor-made Workshops
Workshops for progressive companies and social organisations can be organised around specific themes or challenges (e.g., organisational change or strategic process, making breakthroughs in an area of technological research, leadership training, team building).
They can also focus on a topic such as tools and techniques for innovation or focussed productivity.
Workshops can last for a few hours or days, depending on your needs. It is also possible to build internal training courses which occur over an extended period of time.
Events and Workshops
A number of events open to anyone take place each year, ranging from short introductory online workshops, through to longer seminars or courses (online and in person).
Many of the tools and techniques are highly suitable for use during webinars, although there is less interaction between participants. In-person events and training allow for more in-depth coverage of the topics and obviously benefit from more interaction with others.
The only thing you need to bring is an open mind.
Individual coaching
Individual coaching allows people to go into much greater depth than more generic training, revealing blocks and thought-processes that can stand in the way.
It can be surprising and powerful, with people often finding it genuinely life-changing as unexpected solutions, resources and insights can be discovered.
As with the workshops and training, the emphasis is on providing people with tools and techniques that they can use themselves, rather than providing any ‘advice’, per se.
Innovation and creativity
Overview
The image of the iconic genius – Einstein, Marie Curie, Shakespeare, Frida Kahlo, da Vinci – with extraordinary creative achievements remains powerful in the popular imagination. Rightly so. As well as transforming our cultures and understanding of the world, they provide us with a compelling vision of human potential. In doing so, they also hint at our own possibilities. But they can also serve to intimidate and make our own creative efforts seem trivial and pedestrian in comparison.
While we may or may not be the next Oprah Winfrey, Steve Jobs or JK Rowling, this is simply the wrong measuring stick to use. Rather, the question is: How can we cultivate and maximise our own creativity and innovation in our own lives and in our own particular circumstance? Or, put another way: how can we develop a creative mindset and habits which naturally permeate every aspect of our personal and professional lives, whether it be in the role of scientist, parent, politician, manager, programmer or community activist?
Using a variety of visualisation and tools aimed at expanding our range of cognitive options, as a stand alone offering, this workshop focuses on the creativity side of innovation, exploring how to tap into and utilise the astonishing natural, innate creativity that we all possess, but which too often remains dormant and unrecognised.
Who are the innovation workshops for?
The workshops are for people who want to bring more innovation and creativity into their lives and, in doing so, open up new possibilities for action. The tools and techniques are equally applicable and relevant to both personal and professional situations.
For upcoming workshops, please see events. Please get in contact to enquire about organising a tailor-made workshop for your team, company or organisation.
workshop contents (Entirely Customisable)
- Understanding innovation and creativity as both science and art
- Exploring how the brain establishes patterns and makes new connections
- The role of 'altered states' in creativity and innovation
- The surprising ways in which Edison, Tesla and Dali used day-dreaming and sleep to further creativity
- Shape and image manipulation (applicable mainly for engineering, design, scientific research)
- Understanding the different cognitive options available to us in innovation
- Helping the brain to explore what is 'new and different'
- Quickly switching from distracted multi-tasking to creative focus
- Using questions to stay in generative states
- Utilising your power of visualisation and imagination to create new options
- Developing your own 24/7 advisory committee of experts and mentors
some feeback from particpants
- "different, dynamic"
- "really surprising"
- "I was already doing some of this stuff but not aware of it. I can now be a bit more systematic in the exercises. Excellent""
- "brilliant"
- "given me new confidence in the power of my imagination (I had always thought I was uncreative!)"
- "fascinating"
- "unsuspected power of the exercises"
- "it's just so relevant for me and my team"
some workshop Practicalities
- Workshops can take place in person or online
- Length of workshops can vary from introductory (3 hours) to in depth (3 - 5 days)
- Tailor-made workshops can be designed entirely according to your needs and topics
- Workshops can be comabined with individual coaching to really focus on specific issues
Further information
Ends
Achieving goals
Overview
The ability to set goals (whether big or small, personal or professional, individually or as teams) and take effective steps towards achieving them is critical to accomplishing anything in life. Conversely, when we fail to make progress, the dreams and aspirations that we once had get scaled-back, leading to many people and organisations performing below their peak and others living with a sense of unfulfilled potential and regret about what ‘could have been’.
Closing the gap between ‘intention’ and ‘action’ is what makes the critical difference. For a lucky few, this seems to come naturally. For many, it is a skill which needs to be learned. For all, it is something which can be improved.
Setting a goal means envisaging and desiring a future state which is different to the current state. Taking action towards that goal means implementing a series of steps which change the present state to the desired state. This basic mechanism is the same for small everyday goals (e.g., a desire for a cup of tea) through to complex long term goals (e.g., establishing a company). And ultimately, this requires translation of higher cognitive functions into movements in our sensorimotor system.
Movement – away from ‘threats’ and towards ‘resources’ in the environment – has been the key survival mechanism for living organisms for billions of years. It is a central part of our deep biological heritage. It is what we do.
But as humans began to develop higher cognitive functions (language, planning, reasoning, etc.), the key evolutionary advantage started to shift dramatically away from direct movement (action) towards higher cognitive processing. Yet our underlying biological architecture – and its premium on physical action – has remained largely unchanged.
And yet, we still need both: try delivering a speech without moving your tongue muscles or typing up a business plan without moving your fingers!
This workshop focuses on the profound implications of this action gap for modern life and how we interact with our external environment. It provides participants with practical tools and techniques to enable them to get their cognitive and physical systems to align more effectively behind achieving their goals. Thus, effective action moves from feeling forced and difficult to more natural and desirable.
What could be more important for you or for your organisation?
Who are the achieving goals workshops for?
The workshops are for people who want to gain more control over and alignment between their motivations, thoughts, choices and actionsand, in doing so, open up new possibilities for action. The tools and techniques are equally applicable and relevant to both personal and professional situations.
For upcoming workshops, please see events. Please get in contact to enquire about organising a tailor-made workshop for your team, company or organisation.
workshop contents (Entirely Customisable)
- Why evolution has hard-wired us for action
- The centrality of movement in action
- The predictive brain and how it shapes our actions
- The differences and similarities between cognitive processing and action
- Why the brain is not a computer and why this is so important to understand
- The brain as a prediction machine and why we repeat the past
- Our natural sensing - processing - physical action loop and how to exploit it
- Bringing our goals to life
- Linking our goals to our higher aspirations
- Forging the link between goals, outcomes and movements
some feeback from particpants
- "fabulous. Really interesting."
- "it made me realise EXACTLY what I need to do"
- "brilliant"
- "why aren't more people aware of this stuff? It makes so much sense."
- "I really want to know even more about this"
- "it made me realise why I get easily stuck in my head. Action"
- "just so important"
some workshop Practicalities
- Workshops can take place in person or online
- Length of workshops can vary from introductory (3 hours) to in depth (3 - 5 days)
- Tailor-made workshops can be designed entirely according to your needs and topics
- Workshops can be comabined with individual coaching to really focus on specific issues
Further information
Ends
focussed productivity
Overview
Too many things to do. Too little time to do them. Juggling multiple priorities. Trying to focus in the face of distractions. Competing demands on time and attention. Struggling to balance family and work life.
For far too many people, distracted multi-tasking is the bain of modern-life. At best, it leads to a drop in performance as nothing quite attracts the time and attention it deserves. At worst, it leads to chronic stress and, left unaddressed, burnout.
Indeed, whether you choose to frame it in terms of juggling competing priorities or managing stress (or its debilitating cousin, anxiety), this is so often the underlying cause of a whole range of issues that people seek to address.
But the stresses and strains of modern-life are not going to simply dissappear. The question then becomes how we react to them. Of course, lifestyle changes are often the answer. But in other cases, the key issue is not the situations themselves – which we may or may not have control over – but how we respond to them. This means having more control and autonomy over our thought processes and states; an ability to move our awareness, focus and attention according to our needs, rather than being at the mercy of every new issue, challenge or distraction.
Not only does this lead to greater productivitiy, but also to an improved sense of wellbeing, as we gain more control of our thoughts, attitudes and responses.
Who are the focussed productivitiy workshops for?
The workshops are for people who want to gain more autonomy over how they react to and manage multiple competing tasks and priorities, whether in their personal or professional lives.
For upcoming workshops, please see events. Please get in contact to enquire about organising a tailor-made workshop for your team, company or organisation.
Note: This can also be run as a Stress and Anxiety Management workshop.
workshop contents (Entirely Customisable)
- Understand evolutionary and physiological basis of stress and anxiety
- Understand how and why the brain reacts automatically to stressful situations and learn to change this
- Reframe and utilise stress as your natural biological mechanism to survive and thrive
- Techniques to "close loops"; switch off distracting thoughts
- Learn rapid stress "de-escalation" techniques
- Quick change to focussed and concentrated states
- Identify and change distracting and stress triggers
- Gain more control over your thoughts and choose focus of your attention
- Identify and change negative self-talk and internal dialogues
- Experience transformative power of deep relaxation
some feeback from particpants
- "I really understand now why I sometimes react the way I do."
- "I had no idea what to expect beforehand, but this was surprisingly helpful."
- "very useful advice to improve mental health"
- "I really will use these techniques in my daily life".
- "practical exercises that can be implemented anytime"
- "I was really surprised something as good as this could be done online!"
some workshop Practicalities
- Workshops can take place in person or online
- Length of workshops can vary from introductory (3 hours) to in depth (3 - 5 days)
- Tailor-made workshops can be designed entirely according to your needs and topics
- Workshops can be comabined with individual coaching to really focus on specific issues
